I leave my flat at six-twenty-eight and cut behind the shophouses because the main road already carries early buses. The walk-up blocks here stack narrow staircases between units — no lift, painted doors on each landing, shoes outside thresholds in sizes that map families without my needing to meet them. Laundry hangs on bamboo poles that extend over the lane like thin bridges. A shirt drips onto the concrete and the stain spreads before the sun can dry it.
The wet market sits at the end of this lane. At this hour the shutters are half-raised and the smell is layered: hose water on tile, crushed ice, ginger root scraped clean. I am not shopping — I am walking the perimeter the way I do when sleep leaves too early and the desk can wait. Vendors roll trolleys stacked with empty crates. Someone shouts a price to nobody in particular, testing volume. The sound ricochets off the walk-up walls and returns thinner.
What I notice today is the floor. The lane slopes slightly toward a drain grate that catches leaf matter and plastic labels torn from produce cartons. Overnight rain left patches that reflect the fluorescent strips vendors switch on before dawn. Each reflection is a small rectangle of white light moving when crates pass over it. The wet market is famous for its food; the lane behind it is famous to nobody, yet this is where the supply chain shows its joints — boxes split open, styrofoam stacked for collection, a hose left running because someone forgot the tap.
At six-forty-one an auntie descends from the third floor with a reusable bag and slippers that slap her heels. She greets a fish stall owner by name, counts notes from a zip pouch, selects two mackerel that gleam under the lamp. The transaction takes ninety seconds. She climbs the stairs again without pausing at my corner. I realise I am standing where delivery men usually park their bikes — there is a scuff mark on the wall at thigh height where boxes slide daily.
By seven the lane narrows psychologically even though the width stays the same. More bodies enter from both ends. Shoulders brush. A pallet jack rattles past and I step into a doorway recess that smells of frying oil from last night's dinner still clinging to the paint. The walk-ups above me wake in sequence — windows open, radio news at low volume, a child complaining about socks. The estate carries vertical life; the lane carries horizontal supply. They meet at the drain grate where I am standing.
I watch a teenager hose the fish stall floor. Water runs toward my shoes and I step back onto dry ground that used to be wet five minutes ago. Time here is measured in preparation cycles: ice refreshed, knives sharpened, scales zeroed. When the first customer queue forms at seven-fifteen, my observation window closes. The lane stops being a corridor and becomes a bottleneck.
I walk home the long way along Tiong Bahru Road. The curved blocks are catching early sun and the air is still tolerable. I think about how many times I have bought vegetables without seeing the lane that fed the stall. Today I saw it — the reflections, the scuff mark, the auntie's zip pouch disappearing up the stairs.
The market does not begin at the entrance — it begins where the hose meets the drain.